Final photo finish for the Creval takeover bid. Crédit Agricole Italia has announced that it is waiving the 90% clause e the Creval shares they immediately aligned themselves with the price of the last raise, up by 3,71% to 12,41 euro, recovering the fall on the previous day. Following the news that arrived today, the subscription period is automatically extended until 17.30 pm on Friday 23 April.
With a press release in the early hours of this morning, Crédit Agricole Italia announced that it will pay 12,5 euros per Creval share – the price of the latest raise from the initial 12,2 euros – even if the adhesions will not reach 90% of the capital, option placed as a sine qua non condition on the occasion of thelast raise on the price. The institute explained that it had decided in this sense after having received commitments to adhere to the offer by 27,2% of the capital, subject however to the waiver - by the issuer - of the condition of exceeding 90% of the capital .
Considering that 22,63% of the capital had already taken part in the takeover bid, this last step brings Agricole's overall stake to 49,83%, one step away from the minimum effectiveness threshold of 50% plus one share . Considering also the quotas already held by Credit Agricole Italia (Cai), the overall stake held by the institute led by the CEO Giampiero Maioli finally rises to about 52% of the capital.
Furthermore, a detail not to be underestimated is that the DFGD of theFrench entrepreneur Denis Dumont, which last Monday had expressed the majority list in the meeting, a list that renewed the Board of Directors for the three-year period. Dgfd has undertaken to deliver 5,3% of the capital. Similar commitments have come from Alta Global Investments (5,1%), Hosking Partners (4,6%), Tig Advisors (4,1%) and Petrus Advisers (3,1%). Overall, therefore, we arrive at 22,2%, but Agricole announced that it had "received confirmation of the intention to adhere to the offer from other shareholders in relation to a further 5% of the issuer's share capital", for a 27,2% total. The latest move by Crédit Agricole Italia should therefore be interpreted as a soothing gesture towards the previous shareholders, as the bank itself has not failed to point out. The outstretched hand came "in the light of the constructive approach and the support to the offer shown by the aforementioned investors and in order to favor the realization of the industrial integration between Creval and the Credit Agricole Italia group", specifies the press release released this morning.
At the same time as the last decisions, the acceptance period is automatically extended until 17.30 pm on Friday 23 April. The shareholders who adhere to the tender offer will therefore receive the dividend of 0,23 euro per share from Creval (on 28 April) and the residual amount of the offer of 12,27 euro from Credit Agricole Italia on 30 April. Finally, Crédit Agricole Italia specified that, given the extension of the acceptance period, the shares purchased on the market on 22 and 23 April 2021 cannot be tendered for the offer.
